WASHINGTON — Republicans seized on a drop in the unemployment rate to assert on Friday that tax cuts were invigorating the economy, highlighting just four days before the election an issue that party strategists are counting on to offset bad news about the war.

The Labor Department announced Friday morning that the unemployment rate had fallen to 4.4 percent in October - down from 4.6 percent in September and the lowest rate since May 2001, when it was 4.3 percent.

Within hours, President Bush mocked Democrats for predicting that the administration's tax and spending policies would wreck the economy.

"If the Democrats' election predictions are as good as their economic predictions, we're going to have a good day on November the seventh," Bush said, drawing a long cheer from a crowd in Joplin, Mo., where he was campaigning for Senator Jim Talent, who is in a close race.

As Bush was attempting to shift the election debate to the positive domestic news, however, Vice President Dick Cheney was addressing head-on what polls showed was the Republicans' greatest political liability: the administration's determination to follow through on the war regardless of public opinion or election outcomes.

"Full speed ahead," Cheney said in an interview with ABC News that was taped for broadcast Sunday, two days before the election.

"It may not be popular with the public," he continued. "It doesn't matter in the sense that we have to continue the mission and do what we think is right. And that's exactly what we're doing. We're not running for office."

Although battle plans always change in times of war, the vice president said, "I think, again, we've got the basic strategy right."

Later, at a campaign stop in Iowa, Bush addressed the subject of the war, calling the cause "noble and necessary" and accusing the Democrats of "second-guessing" without offering an alternative.

Separately, two former Pentagon advisers who were closely identified with the argument for invasion, Richard N. Perle and Ken Adelman, told Vanity Fair magazine that they would not have supported the invasion if they had known how "incompetently" the administration would manage it. Both have previously criticized the administration's conduct of the war.

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The figures showed that the pace of job creation for the month was somewhat lower than anticipated. But the government substantially increased its job growth estimates for the previous two months. Stock prices fell, in part because investors concluded that the Federal Reserve would judge the economy to be so strong that it could not consider reducing interest rates.

Congressional Republicans fanned out to reinforce Bush's message, saying that if Democrats won control of Congress they would raise taxes and jeopardize prosperity.

"This is what we have been campaigning on," said Peter J. Roskam, a Republican state senator in a close race for a Republican-held House seat in the Chicago suburbs.

"Democrats want to nationalize elections and make it all about international affairs and whatnot," he added. "But when it comes down to making the tax cuts permanent, this is a district that gets it."

All year, Republicans have been frustrated by their inability to get more credit for what the statistics suggest is a healthier economy, especially when gasoline prices have come down from their peaks.

Roskam is running against Tammy Duckworth, a Democrat who lost both legs as an Army helicopter pilot in Iraq. On Friday, the National Republican Congressional Committee placed $1.1 million in television advertisements against Duckworth, beginning a weekend barrage. The advertising purchase was the largest that the House campaign committee made Friday, according to records filed with the Federal Election Commission.

Republicans said they relished the chance to get back to debating tax cuts and the economy. Brian Nick, a spokesman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said, "For us to be successful on Tuesday, there obviously needs to be other issues than Democrats hitting us with 'staying the course.' "

Democrats have countered by saying that although unemployment has declined, it remains slightly higher than it was when Bush took office. They say many families are working harder to keep up their quality of life, even as the wealthy benefit from the administration's policies.

In Midwestern and industrial states hard hit by foreign competition and job losses, Republicans remain on the defensive. In Ohio, where four House seats and one Senate seat are in play, reminding voters of the economy's strength has become risky for some Republicans. Representative Deborah Pryce, a powerful Republican in a toss-up race, is under fire from Democrats for calling the economy "storybook."

While Bush was talking up the economy in Missouri, the Republican Senate candidate in Michigan was portraying the same glass as half empty. "More bad news for Michigan," the candidate, Mike Bouchard, said in a news release, arguing that his state had failed to keep pace with the broader recovery. Bouchard sought to blame the Democratic incumbent, Senator Debbie Stabenow, noting that unemployment in the state had risen sharply since she took office.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee responded to Bush's campaign stop for Talent with a television commercial attacking him. "Talent voted for tax breaks for companies that send jobs overseas," the advertisement says. "We have lost over 60,000 manufacturing jobs, and Talent is helping to ship jobs out of the country."

Bush's campaigning has been unusually light for a sitting president, and he heads to his Texas ranch on Saturday night to celebrate the 60th birthday of his wife, Laura Bush. They will return to Washington to watch the election results.